The Odyssey. Homer

The synod grieved, and gave a pitying sigh,

       Then silent sate—at length Antinous burns

       With haughty rage, and sternly thus returns:

       "O insolence of youth! whose tongue affords

       Such railing eloquence, and war of words.

       Studious thy country's worthies to defame,

       Thy erring voice displays thy mother's shame.

       Elusive of the bridal day, she gives

       Fond hopes to all, and all with hopes deceives.

       Did not the sun, through heaven's wide azure roll'd,

       For three long years the royal fraud behold?

       While she, laborious in delusion, spread

       The spacious loom, and mix'd the various thread:

       Where as to life the wondrous figures rise,

       Thus spoke the inventive queen, with artful sighs:

       "Though cold in death Ulysses breathes no more,

       Cease yet awhile to urge the bridal hour:

       Cease, till to great Laertes I bequeath

       A task of grief, his ornaments of death.

       Lest when the Fates his royal ashes claim,

       The Grecian matrons taint my spotless fame;

       When he, whom living mighty realms obey'd,

       Shall want in death a shroud to grace his shade.'

       "Thus she: at once the generous train complies,

       Nor fraud mistrusts in virtue's fair disguise.

       The work she plied; but, studious of delay,

       By night reversed the labours of the day.

       While thrice the sun his annual journey made,

       The conscious lamp the midnight fraud survey'd;

       Unheard, unseen, three years her arts prevail;

       The fourth her maid unfolds the amazing tale.

       We saw, as unperceived we took our stand,

       The backward labours of her faithless hand.

       Then urged, she perfects her illustrious toils;

       A wondrous monument of female wiles!

       "But you, O peers! and thou, O prince! give ear

       (I speak aloud, that every Greek may hear):

       Dismiss the queen; and if her sire approves

       Let him espouse her to the peer she loves:

       Bid instant to prepare the bridal train,

       Nor let a race of princes wait in vain.

       Though with a grace divine her soul is blest,

       And all Minerva breathes within her breast,

       In wondrous arts than woman more renown'd,

       And more than woman with deep wisdom crown'd;

       Though Tyro nor Mycene match her name,

       Not great Alemena (the proud boasts of fame);

       Yet thus by heaven adorn'd, by heaven's decree

       She shines with fatal excellence, to thee:

       With thee, the bowl we drain, indulge the feast,

       Till righteous heaven reclaim her stubborn breast.

       What though from pole to pole resounds her name!

       The son's destruction waits the mother's fame:

       For, till she leaves thy court, it is decreed,

       Thy bowl to empty and thy flock to bleed."

       While yet he speaks, Telemachus replies:

       "Ev'n nature starts, and what ye ask denies.

       Thus, shall I thus repay a mother's cares,

       Who gave me life, and nursed my infant years!

       While sad on foreign shores Ulysses treads.

       Or glides a ghost with unapparent shades;

       How to Icarius in the bridal hour

       Shall I, by waste undone, refund the dower?

       How from my father should I vengeance dread!

       How would my mother curse my hated head!

       And while In wrath to vengeful fiends she cries,

       How from their hell would vengeful fiends arise!

       Abhorr'd by all, accursed my name would grow,

       The earth's disgrace, and human-kind my foe.

       If this displease, why urge ye here your stay?

       Haste from the court, ye spoilers, haste away:

       Waste in wild riot what your land allows,

       There ply the early feast, and late carouse.

       But if to honour lost, 'tis still decreed

       For you my bowl shall flow, my flocks shall bleed;

       Judge, and assert my right, impartial Jove!

       By him, and all the immortal host above

       (A sacred oath), if heaven the power supply,

       Vengeance I vow, and for your wrongs ye die."

       With that, two eagles from a mountain's height

       By Jove's command direct their rapid flight;

       Swift they descend, with wing to wing conjoin'd,

       Stretch their broad plumes, and float upon the wind.

       Above the assembled peers they wheel on high,

       And clang their wings, and hovering beat the sky;

       With ardent eyes the rival train they threat,

       And shrieking loud denounce approaching fate.

       They cuff, they tear; their cheeks and neck they rend,

       And from their plumes huge drops of blood descend;

       Then sailing o'er the domes and towers, they fly,

       Full toward the east, and mount into the sky.

       The wondering rivals gaze, with cares oppress'd,

       And chilling horrors freeze in every breast,

       Till big with knowledge of approaching woes,

       The prince of augurs, Halitherses, rose:

       Prescient he view'd the aerial tracks, and drew

       A sure presage from every wing that flew.

       "Ye sons (he cried) of Ithaca, give ear;

       Hear all! but chiefly you, O rivals! hear.

       Destruction sure o'er all your heads impends

       Ulysses comes, and death his steps attends.

       Nor to the great alone is death decreed;

       We and our guilty Ithaca must bleed.

       Why cease we then the wrath of heaven to stay?

       Be humbled all, and lead, ye great! the way.

       For lo my words no fancied woes relate;

       I speak from science and the voice of fate.

       "When great Ulysses sought the Phrygian shores

       To shake with war proud Ilion's lofty towers,

       Deeds then undone my faithful tongue foretold:

       Heaven seal'd my words, and you those deeds behold.

       I see (I cried) his woes, a countless train;

       I see his friends o'erwhelm'd beneath the main;